Perfect potatoes
harvest in summer and are often referred to as new potatoes. Maincrop stay in the ground for summer where they become much bigger and are ready for harvesting in autumn.
Blight, which is a fungal disease, can occur during wet and warm weather in the summer. So either stick to earlies which are usually ready before blight occurs or choose the variety ‘Sarpo Mira’ as your maincrop because it has high blight resistance.
If you get seed potatoes now, you can start chitting them – just pop them on a windowsill so they start developing shoots and will be ready for planting out.
True to their South American origins, the leaves of potatoes are tender so you can plant out in April but throw a layer of fleece over developing leaves until you’re happy the risk of frost has passed.
The beauty of potatoes is that they are suitable for small spaces – you can grow them in a dustbin, bucket or even a sturdy shopping bag – just so long as they all have drainage holes. You can also buy potato grow bags which are like fabric pots. Use a mixture of all-purpose compost plus well-rotted manure and keep well watered. Allow enough soil space for the tubers to develop, which means one seed potato per 10-litre container.
Fill around a third of the container with the compost and place the potato on top (shoots facing up if it has chitted). Add a layer of compost covering the potato completely. As green shoots develop over the coming weeks, you can keep covering with compost until the container is full. Keep watered so the soil doesn’t completely dry out.
For planting straight into the earth, prepare the ground first by digging in garden compost or well-rotted manure. Space seed potatoes around 30 to 45cm apart. Raised beds are a handy ‘no dig’ method of doing this – start with a thick layer of compost to sow the seeds and then keep earthing up with fresh compost as shoots develop.
In about 14 weeks after planting, you will notice flowers on the plant which usually means the tubers are ready for harvesting. You can leave them in the container or ground during the summer and harvest as required and enjoy your golden bounty.
You can plant out in April but use fleece until frosts have passed